A Senju in the Stars, Chapter 8

Strong. Hashirama thought. There weren’t a lot of entities that could claim to be capable of denting a Rashomon Gate through physical strength alone, especially not when these defensive gates were capable of withstanding a Bijuudama. Then again, the one he summoned just now was hardly the epitome of this technique. A single Rashomon Gate was tough, but he’d seen Eight Gates Users break through one with a lot of effort. Hashirama’s eyes narrowed as he jumped back. He turned to Batu and knew, immediately, that the Astartes would just get in the way of what was to come. Before he could protest, Hashirama sent the armored giant into a sealing scroll. “Sorry for that, but I can’t have you standing in the way.”

He withdrew the chakra from the Rashomon Gate. The massive barrier groaned, its ornate face twisting, then vanished into thin air. An instant later, a hulking figure tore through the fading space, limbs scraping across the ruined ground. It stood fifteen feet tall, a grin sketched on lips that glowed in flickering purple flames. A pinkish hue radiated along its skin, the hue shifting under the unsteady light. Four arms branched from its sides, each tipped with a blade or pincer that gleamed wetly. The body possessed a strange blend of feminine curves and bestial sinew. 

A shimmer caught his eye: a golden crown seemed to float between the creature’s curved horns, bobbing with each step. Its dark eyes, black as the void, narrowed in playful malice, and needle-like teeth glinted when it parted its mouth. The air smelled of burnt wire and ozone, but beneath that lay an unsettling aroma wafting from the daemon itself. Its laugh rose in the silence, half snarl, half purr. And then, it spoke, “You smell delicious.” 

Hashirama huffed and took out a single kunai from his tool pouch. “Thanks, my mother made me.” 

The daemon lunged from the smoke with unnatural grace. One moment it stood ten paces off, the next it blurred to striking distance, both left arms lashing out. One arm ended in a gleaming pincer, the other in a hooked spike, each limb slicing the air so fast it distorted the light. Hashirama stepped into the motion, twisting at the waist. He let the pincer pass an inch from his ribs, feeling the brush of wind along his side. In that single moment, Hashirama jabbed his kunai dozens of times into the daemon’s exposed arms, digging holes through muscle and skin–holes that regenerated almost as quickly as they opened. He jumped away as the daemon turned. His eyes narrowed. Troublesome, but not unexpected. The bijuu were never at all affected by physical attacks. Why should a spiritual creature be any different?

He tossed the kunai at the daemon’s face and watched as the little tool was batted away. It protected its eyes. Why? It’s a spiritual being. Why does it need eyes at all? Is it forced to obey physical laws, after all? Does that mean its body must conform to the anatomy it’s bound to?

Only one way to find out, he mused, as he grabbed another kunai and tied a Shinobi Wire around its grip. The daemon lunged at him again, grinning. It made use of the same attack as before, its left arms reaching out. Predictable. 

Hashirama pivoted. And then, he flicked his wrist and cast a loop of shinobi wire around both forearms. The wire glimmered, bright as steel under half-broken lights, and bit into the daemon’s pinkish hide.

A guttural snarl escaped the creature. Its free arms clawed at the wire, but Hashirama pivoted behind it, keeping the tension tight. Skin parted where the wire cut. Purple ichor seeped out, trailing across the daemon’s angular limbs. Its roar shook the corridor, equal parts agony and perverse delight. Hashirama yanked the wire lower, binding it to the creature’s left ankle in a single fluid motion. He leapt high, planting a foot on a broken rebar, using the momentum to cast the wire over the daemon’s right horn.

A strangled yelp and moan tore from its throat the moment it tried to move. Each jerk of its bound arms forced the horn backward, wrenching its neck at an awkward angle. A moan escaped its needle-toothed mouth. Its eyes, black and empty, flicked about in frustration. Then it lashed out again, this time with both right arms. One ended in a raking claw, the other in a serrated blade. Hashirama slid beneath the attack, crouching so the razor edge passed overhead. With a second wire, he looped those arms as well, cinching them tight until they pressed against the daemon’s ribs. Its raw strength twitched beneath the restraints, muscles knotting under the unnatural flesh.

Summoning a wood clone with a crisp hand sign, he passed the kunai off. The clone bounded behind the daemon, layering coil after coil of wire along its torso, weaving loops around each twisted limb until the creature stood near-mummified in fine cords. The daemon growled, voice rising in pitch, but the wires only cut deeper. Thin rivulets of that eerie fluid leaked down its sides.

He exhaled, a slow and measured breath, leaving the wood clone to keep the bindings taut. A faint tremor ran through the wires as the daemon thrashed, but Hashirama ignored it. He bent his knees and leaped, landing squarely on the creature’s shoulders. The two horns jutted up on either side, knocking against his ankles. The impact caused the daemon’s head to jerk forward, but it remained pinned by loops of wire and the clone’s steady grip. Ash and dust swirled around them, stirred by every flailing motion of the bound monster.

His right palm settled on its brow, where the pinkish flesh gave off that unclean glow. Sparks of purple fire danced across its skin, feathery traces of malign energy. The wire creaked each time it tried to wrench free. Blade-ended limbs spasmed, scraping grooves into the rubble underfoot. Hashirama closed his eyes for a moment, collecting the chakra that would be required for what came next. He’d done something similar with the smaller demons earlier, but not at this scale. This beast was far larger, saturated with an evil aura that radiated in every flicker of that violet flame.

He thought of the lesser abominations, the way he’d forced physical essence into their spiritual forms. The method had been crude but effective. Now he sought to replicate it on a more massive level. One way to know if it would work, and only one.

He made a quick seal with his left hand, channeling a surge of chakra down into the twisted ground. The metal plating buckled, and thick roots burst from below, each one wide as a man’s waist. They writhed like serpents, snapping toward the daemon’s legs and torso. The creature roared at the first touch, flailing in renewed desperation. Steam and blackish liquid spurted where the roots punctured flesh, hissing and spitting as if the contact alone was poisoning it. Yet the roots held firm, bolstered by Hashirama’s chakra.

The daemon tore at the wires, each convulsion shaking the corridor. Stone fragments rained from above as the tension built. Whenever it twisted to break free, the barbed wire and living wood dug deeper, shredding bits of its hide and letting more of that smoking ichor spill. The sight was equal parts horrific and surreal: a monstrous creature pinned like a writhing insect in a spider’s web.

“What is this trickery!?” it screamed, voice high-pitched, words slurring between rage and some manic pleasure. Idly, the First Hokage noted that he could understand the creature’s words somehow. 

Hashirama gave no answer. He breathed in, lips pressed tight, concentrating on the next step. He allowed a steady stream of physical energy to flow from his right hand, pushing it into the daemon’s spirit-flesh. A frantic struggle began on a level beyond mere physical grappling. The daemon’s essence churned, a turbulence that tried to corrode the roots at every turn, eating away at his chakra’s stability. But he persisted, feeding it more raw matter than it could handle, forcing an unnatural union of familiar energies in a vessel other than his body. The result, as before, was an extremely volatile and, frankly, malevolent form of Chakra. 

At first, it moaned in perverse delight, legs thrashing, claws scraping the air. Then the sound changed. A tremor of real fear crept into its voice as more of its essence bled away into Hashirama’s roots. He felt the surging chaos through his senses and recognized how sloppy this conversion was. Faint pulses of corruption gnawed at the wood, threatening to rot it from within. Yet his chakra poured on, funneling that spiritual energy into a form he could absorb. It was far from refined, but in that moment, it worked.

The daemon’s shriek rose in pitch. “Aaaaaagh—!” 

Its limbs bucked and spasmed, wire cutting deeper. Horns strained against the tension. Bits of pink flesh dropped away, dissolving into a foul mist. The crown flickered, gold hue flickering like a candle about to snuff out.

Hashirama’s eyes narrowed, sweat lining his brow as he held the hand seal. He felt each wave of its essence entering the roots, swirling into the coiled channels of their chakra network. The screams pounded in his ears, echoing in the corridor. The monstrous shape began to fade at the edges, turning translucent, losing consistency. The transformation was agonizingly slow, but steady. When it realized, once and for all, that it could not escape with brute force alone, it turned to bargaining. 

“Please!” The daemon cried, black tears spilling from its eyes. “Release me and I’ll give you anything your heart desires! I’ll give you anything! My mistress will grant you all the riches in the universe! Everything and anything you could ever want.” 

Oddly enough, this was not the first time Hashirama heard those exact sets of words. Bargaining usually only came after acceptance. 

When the creature realized that Hashirama was not listening, it resorted to just screaming. Perhaps, it was hoping that, in doing so, it would invite some manner of aid from other smaller daemons, but no such aid came, even as Hashirama converted enough of its essence into chakra to create a miniature bijuu–or fill up a fourth of the Shukaku. 

The final cry faded to a ragged whisper, more quiver than fury. The daemon’s form collapsed inward, reduced to wisps of black vapor that hissed against the cracked deck. Hashirama released his grip on the jutsu. The wires slackened around empty space, and the battered roots quivered. Much of their bark was scorched away, leaving half-charred lengths that peeled and flaked under a lingering corruption. Still, they held together for a breath or two, long enough for him to steady himself atop them.

He gazed down at the spot where the creature had writhed moments before. A trail of viscous residue clung to the splintered wood, each droplet steaming in the gritty air. He could smell the faint stink of putrid cinnamon and perfume or something close to it. He cut the chakra flow in a single motion, and the ravaged vines came apart in a shower of pinkish motes. They drifted upward, catching the dim light before fading like sparks from a dying fire.

Last time, he’d seen a strange flower bloom from corrupted bark—some twisted blossom that seemed half alive with the daemon’s essence. Now, nothing. Perhaps the creature had unleashed so much dark energy that the roots simply could not reshape it into anything but debris. He watched the final scraps crumble into dust and vanish along the floor. The metal plating beneath was pitted with burn marks and shallow grooves, whereupon the daemon thrashed and struggled and screamed for its existence–not life. Not really.

Hashirama mulled over the possibility of pushing the technique further. What if he had summoned grander roots, a vast trunk spiraling up through the broken halls, each limb ready to devour even greater amounts of that spiritual taint? Chakra was a shaping force, capable of blending spirit and matter into forms that bent the ordinary rules of nature. If he’d expanded the scale, would the end product have been more stable—or something more monstrous? 

He shrugged, letting the thought rest. He’d figure it out soon enough. Now, in the middle of a battlefield, was not the time for experimentations and curiosities.